An Unconventional Convention Conversation

Ariel and Jonathan chat about their experiences attending various conventions like Dragon Con! 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
Hey, everybody, Welcome to the Large ner Droun Collider podcast,
the podcast that's all about the geeky things happening in
the world around us, what we can talk about, and
how excited we are to talk about it. I'm Ariel Caston,
and with me, as always, is the ever handsome Jonathan Strickland.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
I can see you.

Speaker 1 (00:31):
You can't see me. I'm sorry. If I had known
we were going to keep our cameras on, I would
have made myself look presentable.

Speaker 3 (00:38):
Oh you look fine.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
Yeah, So, first of all, welcome everybody to the Large
Nerdron Collider.

Speaker 3 (00:44):
But yeah, we typically when we record this, we.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
Often were using an online web studio called riverside to
do it. We're not obviously, we're not in the same space,
which is unfortunate because I think that would make the
conversations a lot more lively.

Speaker 3 (01:00):
If we could do that.

Speaker 2 (01:01):
It's just geography is a pain in the butt. But riverside,
let's you use your video camera, your webcam so that
you can stay in visual contact with the person you're
talking with. But over the last several recordings, we were
having issues or not even the last several, but way
back we were having issues with lots of lag, and

(01:22):
I would finish talking and then there'd be like two
seconds of silence, and then Ariel would say something because
there was this lag, and we figured that the cameras
were contributing to that. And today, as a lark, I
just said, let's just keep the cameras on and see
if it works.

Speaker 1 (01:40):
Yeah, so we'll see if that works. How much lag
was there then, Shonathan.

Speaker 3 (01:44):
About two seconds? Okay, so.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
We're gonna see how it goes. But this is gonna
be more conversational. As you're all aware, the strikes both
sag AFTRA and WGA are continuing, and as such, we
are going to continue our moratorium on talking about Struck material.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
Yes, however, Warner Brothers did just come out with the
fact that they are losing money because they're not putting
out new material. So you know, that's something hopefully that
will encourage producers to Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:18):
It's Warner Brothers. Of course, they're losing money. Like I mean,
they were losing money. They were losing money before the
merger would Discovery. They're continuing to lose money. Now. I
got a lot of opinions on that that I will
just keep to myself.

Speaker 1 (02:36):
Look, I can be hopeful that some of it is
the fact that they don't have writers or actors producing anything.

Speaker 3 (02:42):
So yeah, well I'm sure.

Speaker 2 (02:44):
I mean that's a major contributing factor, right, Like the
stuff that they are releasing hasn't been knocks out of
the park. We won't talk about specific ones, although Ariel,
I understand you saw one of them recently, one of
the ones that was released a couple months ago, very
a very speedy movie, long but speedy, if that's any indication.

(03:07):
But yeah, like those those movies haven't been getting a
whole lot of positive reactions, and that's obviously part of it.
But that also means that they don't have any anything
in the chamber where they've got like the next amazing
picture lined up, because these strikes have been going on
for a while, and that's really gonna hurt not just

(03:30):
Warner Brothers Discovery obviously, but all the major studios that
are you know, looking now at a pretty big gap
in their production schedules and thus their release schedules, and
that's gonna have some massive hits to those quarterly returns,
and shareholders are going to be very unhappy. There's gonna
be more and more pressure on the studios to do
something about this.

Speaker 1 (03:50):
Yeah, And like so fran Tresher the other day said,
producers don't like people are these streaming services are losing money.
We've talked about it before, and I knew that was
going to be an argument. We don't want to pay
a bunch more money when we aren't when we're trying
to figure out how to cut our budget. Right. But
at the same time, franchisious like you're making seventy eight
thousand dollars a day. You can't cry for it, me

(04:11):
just do the right thing.

Speaker 3 (04:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (04:13):
Well, and to that end, like the companies are still
making lots of money through other avenues, right, It's not
like streaming is the one and only outlet, and so
you still have all the people who are creating the stuff,
and they're like, well, yeah, but we're.

Speaker 3 (04:32):
The ones.

Speaker 2 (04:33):
A lot of us are living paycheck to paycheck and
scrambling between gigs so that we can continue to cover
the bills. We're in a much more precarious position than
any studio is.

Speaker 1 (04:44):
Yeah, but I think the studios expected people to like
break by labor day, but writers and actors, again, they've
struggled to pay their bills for years now. They're used
to it, right, Yeah.

Speaker 2 (04:56):
Which is terrible, But at the same time, it means
that they are prepared to continue the fight and not
just capitulate and give in.

Speaker 1 (05:06):
And the like. The sad thing for me is it
means that we are going to lose wonderful people in
the industry who write good things and who do great
work in like AYATSI because they're not working because nobody
else is working, you know. And we've had that happen
in the past, because they're going to they're going to
find other jobs during the strike and then they're going
to stay out of the business. We have mutual friends
who have done that in the past. Yeah, uh, And

(05:30):
so that's sad. I do know that there is the
hope that once the strikes are over, like the floodgates
are going to open, because there was a bunch of
stuff in the works that just got put on pause.
You know, I had like two auditions the week the strike,
right the week the strike happened. Before the strike, I
didn't I didn't break strike rules. But you know, some

(05:52):
of those things will get canceled because people are losing money.
But even the stuff that does pick up all the
stuff that they want to get back roll again. It's
going to take a little bit to gather the people,
gather the resources and get that going again.

Speaker 3 (06:05):
So yeah, and also like.

Speaker 2 (06:10):
Yeah, but there's also going to be independent productions that
are not that are going to be allowed to go on.
We've heard about some of those, like a twenty four
I think was a twenty four or am I getting
that wrong? It might have been a different studio, but
there was like Oh, it's just like there was like
a smaller studio that's that's not being struck because they

(06:33):
are actually making.

Speaker 3 (06:34):
The attempt to.

Speaker 2 (06:36):
Meet the criteria that the WGA and sag AFTRA are
asking for. And so there are some projects that are
allowed to continue because they're actually independent of these big
studio systems. So part of what I hope, and you know,
we've already started seeing some of this play out with
some of the smaller studios, But part of what I

(06:57):
hope is that we also get some truly incre credible
independent films. They get more attention than they normally would
because there's no real competition out there, and it means
that they'll get far more support. Like there are there
are some movies that came out that were incredible but

(07:17):
didn't really get very wide distribution or much notice because
they were from these smaller studios. But you know, there's
going to be a time where that's essentially all that's
going to be out, and maybe that means that we'll
actually start to see perhaps a move toward these smaller
to medium budget movies that are not as grandiose and scope.

(07:40):
They're not as big and spectacle, but they're still very
high quality and really good stories. And I, again, as
a child of like the seventies and eighties, I would
love to see that because I don't need every movie
to be like a Michael Bay explosion on.

Speaker 1 (07:57):
Yeah. Yeah, it's actually been really interesting to fall because
I know that this is a couple of weeks ago now,
But the SAG after said that they were going to
stop giving interim agreements to projects that had WGA written
scripts in support to the WGA, because if the WGA
is striking but their work is still getting done, then

(08:18):
that hurts their position. So there's that, But if you're
an independent company, like you said, not connected to the
AMPTP and not using and not WGA, or you've written
your own script or whatnot, then you can still proceed.
If you're using SAG actors, then you have to abide
by the SAG, the SAG contract that they're trying to

(08:40):
get past, and it is very tactical because if you
are if you're a small company with not a lot
of money, and you're able to successfully make and distribute
a movie using their new standards, then there's no excuse
for the big producers. Right. But non union has also
been going on, like because the union actors can't work

(09:03):
in non union stuff without special permissions. Commercials are still
going on, so there's some stuff, but it's been very interesting.
It's been like this huge educational, like deep dive for
me this year.

Speaker 2 (09:20):
So yeah, yeah, for a lot of people who are
just getting their careers started in the industry, I think
it's been like that, and I mean it's a valuable one.
I think there's obviously an allure to show business. There
always has been, and there's this desire to be part
of it, and I think events like this are important

(09:44):
because it resets your expectations so that you have a
more realistic understanding of what's going on, so that way
you can actually make those calls, right, you can make
an educated call about the direction of your career. Is
this something you want to For a lot of people,
I think they might end up saying, you know what,
maybe this isn't the right one for me. It's too

(10:06):
high risk and it's not there's not enough stability, which
is that's a totally legit decision for people to make,
and then they can go and do whatever it is
they would rather do. And then some people would say,
all right, I understand that there is a very high
level of risk and there's very low stability, but this
is my passion and I'm going to continue to pursue it,
And that's also totally legit. But I think it's good

(10:27):
to have that realistic understanding so that you have your
expectations set properly and you're not setting yourself up for failure.
I think if you have inflated expectations, then every time
you run into a hurdle or an obstacle or a challenge,
you're going to have that kind of disappointment that could
be really devastating.

Speaker 1 (10:47):
Yeah. Yeah, which reminds me I need to send some
love to my representation because they've been working their butts
off to get everything they can during the strike, and
I love them.

Speaker 2 (10:57):
So yeah, this is this is why I no longer
audition for shows because I got asked to do shows
too much, Like I was asked to be in a show,
and by too much, I mean it. It made it
very easy for me to be in stage shows, so
that when I would go to auditions and not land something,
I'd be like, oh right, that's how it's supposed to work.

(11:21):
I've just been coddled and maybe this isn't the right
approach for me because I don't take rejection.

Speaker 1 (11:28):
Well well, and that's that's why you create your own content.

Speaker 2 (11:35):
I mean, yeah, you're I mean it sounds like a burn,
but it's the truth.

Speaker 1 (11:42):
Yeah, yeah, which, like I'm gonna be real honest. I
talked to Jonathan. I don't know if we told you
all this, but I talked with him briefly before the
strike happened about I miss doing our videos and I
want to figure out how to do them. Maybe there's
a way, Like even if we can't because we don't
have a camera guy right now, uh, and nor do
we have an amazing budget for a camera guy, we

(12:04):
could probably eat something out if we want it, but uh,
you know, to pro do some sort of video content,
maybe a hybrid of our mashups so that it was
more like talking hints, but get together and do some
stuff again because I missed that. We obviously can't do
that right now because of the strike. But yeah, like
this is everybody, everybody. I don't care where you are,

(12:26):
either in the entertainment industry, if you're in the entertainment
or created industry. It's all about creating your own content,
That's what everybody says. Because then you can cast who
you want, you can have it the way you want mostly, Yeah,
and you get your you get to enter, you get
to entertain people and bring people joy, and that's the
whole point.

Speaker 2 (12:45):
So yeah, and you have a lot more control, I
mean over things like how you distribute your content that
sort of stuff. And I mean that's that's really what
what the strikes come down to, right, is that these
big production companies they have the they have the first
of all, they have the pockets to fund productions, and
two they have the channels to distribute work.

Speaker 3 (13:09):
And for people who just want to.

Speaker 2 (13:11):
Tell stories, those are big hurdles and it puts a
lot of power into these companies, and that's really what
it boils down to, is that when you've got the
power consolidated in a few really big studios, you get
to the point where the individual has very little leverage
and very little control over their careers and over the

(13:35):
way they can earn money, which is why it's important
to unionize. So anyway, we've had that discussion many times.
What we're going to do now, I think is we're
going to have a conversation about conventions, specific specifically fan conventions,
not industry conventions. For multiple reasons, industry conventions are less

(13:57):
interesting and two that would be treading on st material too.
But yeah, both Ariel and I have been going to
conventions for many years. I've been going longer than Ariel
has because I started going to conventions when she was
a bebe.

Speaker 3 (14:15):
But she's been.

Speaker 2 (14:16):
Going probably two more events because I kind of stopped
going about five years ago. So we're going to talk
a bit about about our experiences convention wise, and I
guess to get started, Ariel, do you remember, like what
your first convention was.

Speaker 1 (14:35):
Yes, it was I don't even know if it could
be called a convention. I think it was. It was
the Festival of Dreams. It was like the place where
I first larped, too. It was a bunch of different
LARPs running one shot, so you could figure out what
LARPs you wanted to go to. It was tiny. A
lot of conventions, so like dragon Con and Comic Con
and all these others, they get really a lot of press, right,

(14:59):
But there are a lot of tiny, tiny conventions. I
learned how many, and probably you did too, between going
and author panels and dragon Artsy and stuff like that
the Atlanta Reader Theater Company. But yeah, the first one
was a little arp one because I wanted to larp.
That was my first yours.

Speaker 2 (15:19):
It's an excellent question. I'd like to say it's Fantasy Fair,
which is sort of Fantasy Fair was kind of the
predecessor to dragon Con in many ways. It was a
very It was one of the larger science fiction fantasy
themed conventions in the Southeast, but it hasn't existed for
decades at this point. But I think that might have

(15:40):
been my first one. But it's hard for me to say,
because the reason I started going to conventions is that
both of my parents, but primarily my father, are authors,
and Dad had published his first novel and I want
to say it was nineteen eighty four when it came out.
It's called to Stand Beneath the Sun's Long Sense out

(16:01):
of print. But being an author meant that you would
often get invitations to participate in conventions, because conventions needed guests,
and the guests would sit on panels and talk about
their work and their process and interact with fans of
the genre, sometimes fans of the actual guest, because you know,

(16:22):
keep in mind, these are smaller conventions. So we're talking
about authors who are local but not necessarily really well
known at this point, A few of them were. They
would usually get one or two very notable guests to
come in, but that would be it like Dragon Con.
You would look at the who's attending list, you know,
like two months out, you'd be like, it would just

(16:43):
be a who's who in science fiction, fantasy and horror
and comics and that kind of thing. But these smaller
conventions would be much more modest in size and scope,
so you might get like George ta Kay might be
like the guest of honor, right, or sometimes it might
be an author who is pretty well known. And Dad

(17:04):
would often be invited to these. So I went to
things like Fantasy Fair Phoenix Con, which was another smaller
convention here in Atlanta. There was one that would kind
of move around in the Southeast. I seem to recall
it being in Tennessee, but it was called Dixie Trek,
and then there were a few others later on, after

(17:26):
Fantasy Fair went away and dragon Con started to become
a thing. My dad was the first master of ceremonies
of the very first dragon Con. We also got a
convention called magnum Opus Cohn, which for a while was
competing with dragon Con. It became like this rivalry between
the two conventions.

Speaker 3 (17:46):
So that was kind of my.

Speaker 2 (17:48):
Wheelhouse as I was growing up. I was going to
conventions a lot as a kid, so my experience was
different from the average congoers experience because I was always
a guest, because my dad was a guest, like as
in I would have a little ribbon on my badge
that would give you like access to everything, and as
a kid, I didn't understand that everybody else didn't have that.

Speaker 1 (18:12):
Yeah, yeah, I am. I have a similar remembrance about
like my first theater. I think my mom listens so
she'll correct me if I'm wrong, But I think like
the first play that I had any sort of like
contact with was Pippen because my parents were working on it.

(18:32):
This could be a fever dream, but I feel like
when I was very very young, my parents worked on
Pippin and then on Golden Pond, and I couldn't tell
you anything about the shows from that time because they're
not really you know, little kid shows. But that's like
my remembrance, So I feel like that's I can almost
vaguely relate to you here. I'm not sure which was my

(18:54):
first con entirely? Yeah, but yeah, my second con was
dragon Con.

Speaker 2 (19:02):
Oh wow, Yeah, dragon CON's a big, a big second one.
I mean, was it a was it already a pretty
big convention at that point?

Speaker 1 (19:11):
I mean, you tell me it was when you guys
did Guards Guards with John hys Davies.

Speaker 2 (19:17):
It was that was a fairly yeah, by then it
was a fairly large convention. So the first dragon Con
had just a couple of thousand attendees, like maybe maybe
as many as three thousand total.

Speaker 3 (19:30):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (19:30):
And to give you some perspective, more recent dragon cons
are in like the sixty thousand range something like that,
so you know, twenty times larger, but yeah, the so
I was going to dragon Con when it was a
much smaller convention. I was also obviously going because I
was in guards guards for that one when you when

(19:52):
you were at that convention. So it's interesting because like
by the time dragon Con was growing up, the these
smaller to medium size cons were starting to die out.
They there were still were a few, but some of
them were just there just wasn't enough support anymore, and

(20:12):
they kind of like it was like all the energy
was getting sapped into dragon Con, and that dragon Con
kept getting bigger and bigger, and these smaller to medium
size conventions, which happened, you know, throughout the year, just
weren't able to get the traction because more and more
people were like, well, I'm just gonna do the one.
I'll do dragon Con. But what's interesting to me is that,

(20:34):
like when I was growing up and I was going
to these conventions, they served a very particular purpose because
you have to remember that when I was going to
these conventions as a kid, it was before the World
Wide Web, Like there was no easy way to connect
with fellow fans of the stuff you loved. Because if
you were from a small town like I was, there

(20:57):
was a good chance that no one else in that
small town gave a crap about the stuff you loved,
and so you'd just be like, well, I love this thing,
and I wish I could talk about it, but there
ain't no one here who wants to talk about it.
But a convention was a place where you could do that.
And that's where things like panels and even just panels
that were run by fans that had no celebrities whatsoever

(21:19):
in them. Those became really lively because it was people
who were passionate about something and they had the opportunity
to come into a real physical space and have conversations
about the stuff they loved with other people who also
love that stuff. And obviously that would change with the
introduction of the World Wide Web, and you suddenly started

(21:40):
having like message groups and fan pages and subreddits and
all this kind of stuff that would grow up around
the web and allow people to have those conversations no
matter where you were. Like it broad in that dramatically,
But when I was a kid, the way you had
these conversations was that you would to a convention and

(22:01):
you got into lively discussions with other fans of the
stuff you loved. And that's what made those conventions really
really special, and that still happens today, but it feels
a little different because there's so many other ways you
can also have those conversations.

Speaker 1 (22:19):
Yeah, I guess before I did conventions, I did have
a couple of meetups. So I used to be a
part of BBS's because, like my parents were at computers
since I was very very little, you know, my grandpa
worked for IBM back like towards the inception, So I

(22:42):
had been on like BBS's bulletin board systems for those
who don't know, which are like message centers, like chat forms.

Speaker 2 (22:51):
And.

Speaker 1 (22:54):
We would occasionally have meetups. It's not really a convention,
that's more just the social gathering. I will say. My
first Dragon Con I went. I bought a one day
ticket because I just want to see what it is,
and then I really enjoyed it, so I bought a
second day ticket, and then I bought the third day ticket,
and that was way more money than buying a full

(23:15):
weekend pass. But I also realized at the end of
that I spent most of the time talking to people
I knew from LARPing and the Renaissance Festival and all
these other venues in theater, and I attended very few panels.
And so the next year I worked it, and I
worked it for many many years, and then I stopped
working it and now I really only go if I'm performing.

Speaker 2 (23:37):
So yeah, yeah, it's interesting because you've had a very
different kind of journey than I did. Like you, you
volunteered and would work staff at the con so you
would do all sorts of different duties. Can you talk
a bit about some of the roles you performed as
you worked at Dragon Gon.

Speaker 1 (23:58):
Yeah, so the first year, I actually after the first year,
the second year, I was offered a position in information services,
which is, you know, you sit at the desk, can
you tell in one of the hotels and you tell
people where they can go? And I worked that and
how to get to the places they want to get to.

Speaker 3 (24:20):
Where I can go.

Speaker 1 (24:22):
Yeah, yeah, truth and and so I did that for
a couple of years, and I usually tried to frontload
my convention. I believe I want to work all of
the hours in like one and a half days and
then be done. But I quickly lost that desire to

(24:42):
be done working because I found out that's what I
really enjoyed. So I worked information services. That's how I
got a voice actor. Oh my god, I can't remember
his name and I can't say what he's from. Oh gosh,
I think it's George.

Speaker 3 (24:56):
Low Okay, oh oh okay, yeah, yeah, yah yeah.

Speaker 2 (25:01):
I was working information amuson like cartoon network type stuff.

Speaker 1 (25:06):
Yeah. George Lowe came up to the information booth one
day and brought us donuts and was like, who's your daddy?
Because we were helpful to him. It was very nice.
It wasn't for me, but I'd happened to be there
and it was delightful. He seemed very nice. And then
after information.

Speaker 2 (25:26):
You're telling me, George low was literally a sugar.

Speaker 1 (25:31):
Daddy kind of he was being he was being friendly. Again,
could be a fever dream like eventually all these things
start melting together, but I'm pretty sure that happened, Okay.
And then I started in my you know, normal boring
day life working for a mutual friend of ours who

(25:55):
also worked at the Renaissance Festival, and he also headed
up technical operations for some of the hotels, and so
I switched over to tech ops to help him. And
that was like bringing different equipment to different rooms, setting
it up eventually I ran the small ballroom in the
marriotte A one o two five one five two, I

(26:18):
don't remember, it's been quite a few years. And I
would run tech for that, and then I would fill
in by like moving tech from rooms to room and
troubleshooting and all that. It was a really great community
and lots of fun people, and I enjoyed doing it.
But the thing that I enjoyed doing most with that
was that small ballroom had a lot of like older actors,
so people who had been in things that maybe even

(26:43):
aired before I was born, or maybe they were still
doing things, but they had a longer history. They weren't
like the super new hit people that fill you know,
ten thousand seats per se. And I really enjoyed listen
listening to them talk about industry and but I also

(27:06):
kind of proved that I could be around well known
people and beachill about it. And I also had this
immense wealth of knowledge of how dragon Con worked between
tech ops and information services and you know, kind of
helping out the people as they came in my ballroom
if they needed extra help, and knowing where to get

(27:27):
answers and how to get answers, so Eventually I moved
to backstage security and access and I did that for
quite a few years, and you know, basically making sure
like the guests of the convention had the things they
needed before and after their panel, that people weren't coming
back and bugging them, that they knew how to get
to the next place they wanted to go. It's all
part of a giant call. And most of the time
I stood in a corner and was invisible and just

(27:48):
there if people needed me and to troubleshoot problems. But
it was a lot of fun.

Speaker 2 (27:53):
Yeah, Ariel would do things like help coordinate pathways so
that you know, could find a fairly low traffic or
sometimes behind the scenes route that they could go so
that they could get to their next appointment, or be
able to retreat back to their VIP space or go

(28:14):
to their room without being mobbed by fans, which can
be a thing. Like we have had some very very
high profile guests at Dragon Con in literature and film
and music. I mean, you know, we've had incredible directors.
Terry Gilliam, one of the founding members of Monty Python,

(28:36):
who has obviously directed many amazing films that I won't
mention by name, but are they're phenomenal?

Speaker 1 (28:42):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (28:43):
He was a guest at Dragon Con and like he
was very like, very friendly and very willing to engage
with guests, to the point where he famously and his panel,
got up from behind his table, walked over in front
of the table and sat down so that there wouldn't
be a barrier between him and the audience and he

(29:04):
could have his conversations with them. And that's amazing. But
obviously there are other guests who are less comfortable with that,
or who are just so in the spotlight at the
moment that they can't walk three feet without being stopped,
and if they stop, then a huge group will form

(29:25):
around them immediately because everyone wants to have their moment
with this person. So it's important for people in the
guest services and area like that they're able to be
they're able to help them navigate the con so that
their experience is just as positive as the fans experience

(29:46):
and that they will want to come back and that
they don't have like that really negative kind of connotation
with fan conventions that can happen if people get a
little too excited and forget to be courteous.

Speaker 1 (30:01):
Yeah, and what I will say is usually I worked
the backstage of a ballroom or multiple ballrooms. We kind
of switched around throughout the day. Dragon con does have
a dedicated group that is transportation and then security detail
between appointments and also if you want to go out
into the convention, so we worked with them a lot.

(30:22):
Occasionally I would have to fill in if somebody if
like an emergency happened and someone wasn't able to get
there in time, but the person needed to leave or whatnot.
You know, we had a large group of people who
were able to help basically put out fires, which is
what you want to do when you know a lot
of the workings of a convention. So yeah, so lots

(30:44):
of people, but it was lots of fun. There are
still guests who will like they are famous enough that
I'm surprised that they just walk around the convention by themselves.
There was one that a mutual friend told us. So
I went to Dragon this year only briefly, only for
my performances, which I'm glad because a bunch of people
have been catching COVID and you know, thankfully I am

(31:08):
not one of them. Uh you know, I tried to
be really safe, and I tried to only be there
a limited amount of time. And now I feel better
about that decision because you know, when you're there, you're
you're kind of like, oh, man, do I want to
stay longer? Do I want to come on my day off?
Because like this is this could be fun. But a
mutual uh, a mutual friend of ours told us told

(31:30):
me about a celebrity that had just like gone to
gaming in the dealer's room by themselves, and I was
surprised the level of that celebrity would be able to
do that without harassment, but apparently they have. They had
done it a couple.

Speaker 2 (31:42):
Of times and enjoying it out of curiosity. Can you
name the celebrity because.

Speaker 1 (31:46):
I mean the events over Ethan Peck.

Speaker 2 (31:49):
Yeah, I'm not familiar with Ethan Peck, but then I
am I am old and out of touch and say
what they're from.

Speaker 1 (31:59):
Yeah, I'll tell you afterwards. Also, just you know, she
might have been with security detail I couldn't tell, but
just walking between the hotels Jewel State just walked by.

Speaker 3 (32:10):
So that's cool.

Speaker 2 (32:12):
Yeah, I've had some celebrity encounters at these conventions beyond
the fact, like I mean, I could go into the
like the the con suite for VIP. There's typically a
con suite for general attendees at a lot of these conventions,
and that's a place where you can go and get
a drink or get some snacks and hang out and
chill and be out of the general like traffic area.

(32:36):
Not every convention has them, but a lot of them do,
especially when the ones I went to when I was
a kid. And then some conventions also have a separate
con suite that's just for the guests and stuff, so
that they have a place that they can go and
just like zone out or chat with you know, their peers,
or get a snack or get a little bit of

(32:56):
rest and meditation time before they have to go and
inter face with the crowd again. Uh So I've had
experience with both, but yeah, I would run into folks occasionally.
I try not to make it a big thing because
obviously if you make it a big thing, then lots
of other people could make it a big thing, and
then it just maybe some celebrities feed off that, but

(33:17):
I think a lot of them don't. So I was
just like, all right, just be cool, just be cool.
So like I was gone an escalator and realized that
the guy in front of me was Billy West, a
voice actor whom I am very familiar with his work,
and I was just like, I'll just be cool. I'm
not gonna bring any attention to it, but it is neat,
And there there have been other cases where you know,

(33:39):
I just look up and I think, oh.

Speaker 3 (33:40):
Wow, that's Lucy Lawless.

Speaker 2 (33:43):
She looks amazing, and so yeah, there's there's a I've
had a few of those experiences, but not nearly as
many because obviously, like like most of the stuff I
did when I was when I was a guest, later
on, once I got old enough where I no longer was
cute and so I couldn't fall under my dad's badge anymore.
You're still oh you're sweet, but not like I was

(34:07):
when I was, you know, a preteen. So like when
I was attending Dragon Con as a guest in like
the you know, like twenty sixteen kind of range, it
was through my work as a writer and podcaster, and
so I was on the podcast track and I would
get either a guest badge or sometimes it was a

(34:30):
participant badge. The designation was essentially to say, guests are
people folks want to come to the convention to see
participants are people who are also there, so at least
that's how I always felt. But it was fine because
I was like, I never had the illusion that people

(34:51):
are coming to any of the panels just for me,
except for when I would do a panel specifically as
a live text stuff recording, because there's no reason you
would go to that unless you knew who I was.
So but yeah, it was a lot of fun. I
saw some great panels over the years. I didn't go
to tons either, because again, and I think a lot

(35:14):
of people don't. I think they might go to one
or two, and then the rest of the time they're
spending socializing looking at costumes or being in costumes, or
going maybe to an event like the Masquerade, which is
the big costume contest, or they're going to parties and
dances and that kind of stuff. So the panels I

(35:34):
remember distinctly. I saw one of a group of people
who would.

Speaker 3 (35:43):
Test folklore.

Speaker 2 (35:46):
They were folklore testers, and they would tell you at
the end of their experiment whether the folklore was possible
or not.

Speaker 1 (35:58):
One of them was a dry on this year, and
the yeah, before they shaved it was made them unrecognizable.

Speaker 2 (36:08):
Yeah, they look like they could have been one of
Gandalf's drinking buddies. Yes, you're talking about Adam Adam Savage.
Adam Savage, But Adam Savage also he's famous for coming
up with like costumes that let him hide his identity
to a certain extent so that he can wander the
floor because he loves to do that. He loves to

(36:29):
see all the creations and all the creativity, and he's
got a long history of doing that where he would
create a costume. I mean, the dude's a master prop maker,
so he would make it a phenomenal costume that would
comfortably hide his identity and then just wander the floor
and see everybody out there, and no one would know

(36:50):
that this was a celebrity who was walking by. He's
not the only one who's done that either. There are
other celebrities who have done similar things, which I just
think is cool because to me, that tells me that
it's someone who still has a foot in the fan
part of the experience. They're not just you know, the

(37:11):
object of fan adoration. They themselves have some of that
fandom in them as well.

Speaker 1 (37:17):
Yeah, Yeah, and I mean that's what it's what it's
really all about. You know. It's one of my favorite
things to do. I don't cause play really anymore, but
not saying I wouldn't, but I just generally am like,
I want to spend my money and time on other things.
But I love watching other people's cause plays because they're

(37:41):
just it comes from a place of love for the
for the thing that they're portraying so much that they
put all this time and energy and care into it,
and it's just really amazing to watch and see and
the creativity and the mashups. I just love it.

Speaker 2 (37:59):
Well yeah, yeah, Like the mashups are the costume equivalent
of what we would do in our mashups, right, Like
we would take two or more properties and combine them
and say, what would happen if you if these two
were to collide and all the script pages got mixed up?
This is what I think would happen. Well, there a
lot of the cosplays out there take that same concept,

(38:19):
but they put it into physical form with those costumes,
and some of them, some of them I look at
and I'm like, that was really creative and really clever,
and I love how you pulled it off. Some of
them I look at and think, I know there's connective
tissue in your mind between these two properties, but I
don't see it, and I don't understand. I mean, I
understand where where the ideas came from, I don't understand

(38:43):
how they combined. And of course some people will just
create like frame perfect costumes based off of stuff that
they've seen in film or television or anime. I always
love it when I get a chance to chat with
folks who actually work in costume in the industry, because
they'll talk about how, yeah, the stuff you see on

(39:04):
the floor is better than the costumes you would see
on a production floor because they only have to be
so good, right like the camera, especially if you're talking
about like classic science fiction and fantasy films, like you
would be shocked at how low quality some of that
stuff can appear when you're really up close to it.

(39:27):
And meanwhile, you would go to dragon Con and see
someone who has created a replica of that costume. But
because you're actually going to be in that physical space,
they have made it to look the way it looked
on screen, not the way it looks in real life.
And that is phenomenal.

Speaker 1 (39:42):
I mean that is super phenomenal. It's crazy impressive. I'm
always jealous because I want to be able to do that.
I also appreciate the people who are not great craftsman's
but still really try.

Speaker 3 (39:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (39:57):
Yeah, We've got a friend who has his own convention
called Cardboard Con, and the whole gimmick behind it is
all the costumes and props are made out of cardboard boxes.
And even with that, the creativity is phenomenal.

Speaker 1 (40:11):
Yeah, this this friend is amazing at creating things. It's
one of our friends who jumped out of the industry
during the last strike, but is a professional property like
props maker, So really phenomenal, you know. And then I
always feel bad for the people who have obviously put

(40:31):
a lot of effort into their costume and I have
no idea what it is, and they're hanging out in
like again, this is largely DragonCon, but I guess it
happens at smaller cons too. They're kind of hanging out
in the public area hoping people will take pictures of them,
and no one's really I'm sure they have people take
pictures of them. But there was an entire thread this
year on Facebook of did you have a cause play

(40:53):
costume that no one got except for like one person
post it here because we want to celebrate it.

Speaker 3 (40:58):
You know, I think it all.

Speaker 2 (40:59):
I think it all falls on what you're hoping to
get out of the cosplay experience, right, Like, if you
are hoping to get a lot of attention and a
lot of compliments on your your craft or your your
clever approach to the costume, you're taking a risk, right
because there is the chance that no one's going to
really understand it, or get it or appreciate it. If

(41:22):
you're doing it because you have this genuine love for
this thing and you're expressing your love, then obviously that's
a lower risk. I mean, it's always nice to get
recognition and acknowledgment. That's always going to be nice. But
if you're if your main purpose is because no, I
love this thing and that's why I needed to do it,
then you're going to get some satisfaction no matter what.

(41:43):
But I mean I always feel that way too, Like
I see people who you know. It's also it also
can be frustrated when you see someone who's in a
costume that you know you don't even know how much
time they put into it, Like some costumes. You might
sit there and just assume, oh, they went thrifting and
they found, you know, a few different pieces and through
it all together, and you don't realize, no, they hand
sewed every element of that costume. And sometimes the effort

(42:07):
isn't isn't obvious right in the costume, but that doesn't
mean that the person didn't pour countless hours into it. Meanwhile,
you might have someone else who has an off the
rack costume and maybe they are really attractive, right, They
could be a really attractive person who's wearing a bought
off the rack costume piece and they're getting lots of attention,

(42:32):
which definitely happens. And I'm not being gender specific, because
I've seen dudes and I've seen women, and I've seen
people who do not identify with either gender get tons
of attention because they happen to be smoking hot. But
they're wearing a costume that obviously wasn't like a handmade

(42:54):
kind of cosplay thing, and they're getting a lot of attention.
So I mean, like it could be really disheartening then too,
if you've poured a lot of work into something and
haven't received that same kind of attention.

Speaker 1 (43:05):
Yeah, yeah, I had another point I was going to make,
and it's completely slipped my mind. I do like, so
Dragon Con kind of is this way, but I think
it's almost gotten too big. It was really nice in
twenty twenty one when they capped attendance and it wasn't

(43:28):
crowded again. You could actually move around and breathe again.
I was only there for my performance, but it was
it was everybody was kind of like, this is really chill.
But like the smaller conventions that happened, I love them
because they are just there's that community energy there. I
haven't been to an industry convention yet, but yeah, the

(43:52):
community is what you know with like like the people
who we talk with who listen to our show. The
community is what makes it right.

Speaker 3 (44:00):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (44:00):
Absolutely, Yeah, there's when it gets too big, not too big.
When it gets at a certain size, you start to
lose that community because you've got it's just it's too
large to be able to have that communal feeling. You know,
you are all you are all gathered there because of
your love of the thing. In some cases with Dragon Con,

(44:20):
now it's the love of the con. It's not the
love of something else that the con taps into. It's
the con itself, like it's become meta. But in other cases,
like you have sub communities within dragon Con where you know,
you like the filters filk Filk singing is like folks singing,

(44:41):
but all the songs typically tie into geek properties, so
you'll have like a song that is a parody of
an actual song, but the lyrics have all changed, and
now it's about like some you know, famous science fiction
or fantasy show or or movie or something, but that

(45:02):
would have its own community. The gamers would have their
own community. And there are a lot of jokes about
the gaming community because there are a lot of jokes
about if you're going to go into the gaming room,
do it early in the con because they won't leave
that room and it will get a little rank. I
don't think that's a fair thing to say, but sometimes

(45:24):
it's accurate.

Speaker 1 (45:25):
Also, I think gaming has moved to the America's mark
now for dragon Con, which is a convention center kind
of so you can't just spend twenty four hours a
day there.

Speaker 3 (45:34):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (45:35):
Well, and you know a lot of conventions also have
dealer's rooms. Dragon Con is no exception. And dragon Con
has reached the size where I was reading about people
being in line to get into the dealer's room because
you know, obviously the capacity is capped because otherwise it
would be a fire hazard, and they would be They'd say, yeah,
I had to wait for like two or three hours

(45:57):
before I was able to go into the dealer's room.
At the smaller conventions, that was never an issue. The
nice thing about the dealer's rooms again from my childhood,
because again the Internet was not a thing yet, at
least not a thing that was publicly accessible. It meant
that that's how I got introduced to a lot of stuff,
like a lot of like gaming systems, for example, I had.

(46:21):
I grew up in a town that didn't have a
hobby store that had like role playing game systems and stuff.
The closest comic book store to me was a forty
five minute drive away, so it wasn't something that I
could easily visit, And conventions were places where I found
out about things like the Paranoia RPG or other RPGs

(46:44):
that like the Call of Cthulhu RPG, stuff that I
had heard of Dragon Dragon con Dungeons and Dragons, but
I hadn't heard about any of these. And it's also
places where you could do things like discover that yes
you two have and a session with collecting dice. My
name is Jonathan Strickland. I've been sober for about fifteen

(47:06):
years now, but I've had a real hard time with
dice in the past. But yeah, like like that's that
to me was another one of those magical things.

Speaker 1 (47:15):
Yeah, you're gonna start an RPG soon, so hopefully you
can stay sober. I'll help you.

Speaker 2 (47:19):
I've got I've got two bags of dice in front
of me, so I think I should be good. So
because even though I haven't I haven't set pencil to
paper in an RPG in so long, but I kept
my dice. So yeah, like so many little special things
about these conventions that the smaller ones, I think it's

(47:43):
easier to discover a lot of those magical things the
larger ones, I mean, the scope and spectacle are off
the chain, like It's Dragon con is like nothing else
I've ever experienced. But I think there's value in both
the smaller conventions and the really really like big celebrations too.

Speaker 1 (48:02):
I think so too. And this is a little bit
hypocritical because like the smaller conventions, usually I only go
to if I'm performing again. It's just a time and
money management thing. But I almost get sad when they
get bigger, because they lose something the bigger they get.

(48:26):
But I'm also very happy that they're successful and people
are that excited about what they're covering.

Speaker 2 (48:32):
When they're smaller, you can do more right like you
can you can go to more things at the con,
like you don't have to worry about, well, I'm gonna
have to get in line two hours before this panel
or I'm not going to make it into the room
because it'll be too full, which means for those two
hours I don't get to do anything else, and probably

(48:53):
for the next two hours I won't get to do
anything either because I would have had to have already
been in line to see the next big panel. And
dragon Con does something that some other conventions. Some do
and some don't, And I honestly I don't know if
they did it this past year, but they had been
doing room clears where at the end of a panel
you had to leave the room so that way you

(49:14):
couldn't just scope out a spot in a ballroom, for example,
sit down and park it for five hours so that
you could see the one panel you were interested in
and then just sit through everything else that was in
that room. That was not something you were able to do.
You would have to leave the room at the end
of the panel, and the whole purpose of that was

(49:35):
to prevent that kind of camping.

Speaker 1 (49:38):
I think they still do that, but I'm not sure
because I I, for instance, our Guards Guards performance with
the Atlanta Radio Theater Company hint capacity Every seat was full,
which is fantastic, but they cleared the room. But there

(49:59):
also wasn't an anything in that room for quite a while,
so it wasn't the same rush as you'd get in
like a giant ballroom of like everybody needs to be
out in the next ten minutes. But yeah, So I
have a question for you, and you may not have
an answer because I don't even know if I have
an answer, but I'm going to ask it anyhow. Is
there a topic that you wish there were a convention

(50:19):
on that you have not seen a convention on yet,
or if you were going to start a convention.

Speaker 2 (50:25):
Yeah, that's interesting, an interesting question because a lot of
the things I would be into, obviously there are already
cons that cover it. Right, Like if you say video games,
then you're talking about, like Packs is like the con
to go to, or really just any games in general,
not just video games, board games, tabletop games. Packs is

(50:47):
the place you want to be. If I were to say,
like just specifically fantasy or science fiction literature, then that
would obviously be something like World Con, which really focuses
on the literature side and less so on the media side.
So yeah, that's really interesting.

Speaker 3 (51:06):
Maybe you know what.

Speaker 2 (51:09):
I saw a video about a big Halloween centered convention
in California where it was a bunch of haunts that
were throughout the state of California. They came together and
put out a sample of their haunts, and then they
had vendors who were selling you Halloween themed stuff, horror

(51:31):
themed stuff. They had horror guests, they showed horror movies.
I would love to see something like that in the
Southeast where it's not specifically a horror convention, but more
like a Halloween themed convention, so that you could get
that itch scratched and maybe get ideas for things like
whether you wanted to find a haunt that you wanted
to attend, Like, oh, I got to go to that

(51:53):
haunted house. I saw a sample. It was phenomenal. I
gotta see the big scale version, or if it's something like, hey,
you know, I was thinking about getting into this myself,
and now I can talk to professionals who do this
or amateurs who do this and understand some of the
pros and cons and tips and things to avoid. I

(52:13):
think that'd be really cool. But on a really late
a note of this, and I know this is a
very long answer, I would love to see the same
sort of thing for Renaissance festivals.

Speaker 1 (52:23):
Yeah, yeah, truthfully, yes, so a Halloween slash Renaissance festival convention,
which is awesome. Actually, I don't even know if there
are any Renaissance festival conventions. They're kind of like their
own similar sort of a creature.

Speaker 2 (52:40):
Yeah, I would love to be able to go to
something that was like you get to see acts that
are local to specific festivals that don't necessarily travel the circuit.
I mean, there could be circuit acts there too that
I would not want to deny that. But like I've
I've never been to the Maryland Festival, which great things about,

(53:01):
but I've never been there and I don't even know
what their local acts are. Like I've been to Georgia Carolina, Pennsylvania,
and one of the New York festivals, I think the
Sterling one, and that's it. Like I haven't been to
any of the other ones, and I would love to
just kind of get a taste for some of the
other stuff. It's obviously a huge lift because these festivals

(53:24):
all have their seasons at different times of year, so
you would have to pick a time where you would
have the most participation, probably outside of their normal seasons.
But then you'd also have to handle things like how
do I cover their travel costs and everything, because they're
scattered across the entire nation.

Speaker 1 (53:42):
Yeah, yeah, February perfect timing for it. I actually don't know.
I just I don't hear about a lot of festivals
happening in February, nor haunted houses. Most have wrapped up
by that time for me, and there might be something
like this already. But I would love a convention that's
all about like the cooking competition shows that you get

(54:06):
that's like half educational and half like challenge and fun,
like you know, nailed it and is it cake and
things like that, so panels talking about it, workshops where
you can try your hand at it, you know, like
during the pandemic. I did a nailed It challenge at
home that was intense and very difficult. Like I'm a

(54:28):
good baker, not well on that challenge, you know, so
I don't. Maybe what I'm describing is more like community college,
so I can learn how to cook better, but more fun.

Speaker 2 (54:41):
I mean, there's there's so much entertainment out there that
is centered around cooking and baking, right Like, whether it's
web series or actual like streaming series or TV series,
there's tons of it. So I think that's a legit thing. Yeah,
Like now for me, you win me over just by
it being about food, Like I've definitely gone to like

(55:02):
the Atlanta Food Festival, but that's not that's nothing like
what you're talking about, because that's really just more of
It's kind of like what I was talking about with
the Halloween stuff, except it's about Atlanta restaurants, right Like
you go there and all these different restaurants are there
with samples of some of the stuff that they make,
and for you know, a certain price, you get to
go in and try as much of the stuff as

(55:24):
you want to, or or it's like a limited amount,
like you've got a wristband that gives you like ten samples,
so you've got to pick where you're going.

Speaker 3 (55:31):
To go or whatever.

Speaker 2 (55:33):
But it's a great way to sample different restaurants in
Atlanta without you know, dedicating an entire night to trapesing
across the city and hoping that you like the place.
And so I'm totally down with that. But what you're
talking about being more of an immersive, participatory, integrated experience,
I think that sounds incredible, like because that you could

(55:54):
still have that promotional element an event like that, but
you also have this inner active element that something like
the Food Festival doesn't have. It's it's more of a
glorified like food truck gathering than anything else. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (56:09):
Well, and like you can do like the Epcot Food
and Wine Festival. And I don't know about their other
food related festivals, but the Food and Wine Festival, I
do know that sometimes they will have like workshops on
food or mixology or whatever, and you can cook something,
but it's so expensive and it's just a one off,
like that's that's one extra cost for one thing.

Speaker 2 (56:30):
Yeah with it, and you've already spent You've already spent
a good amount of money just to get into the park,
and so you always have that weighing on you where
you're thinking, I need to get the value out of
what I've spent or I'm going to regret this. And
then on top of that, you have to spend more
to take a class which is going to take up
time in the park and you and you're sitting there

(56:52):
thinking like I could have written test track.

Speaker 1 (56:54):
Yeah yeah, and you have to pay for all the food,
like your ticket doesn't include the food.

Speaker 3 (56:59):
So I am totally cool just walking.

Speaker 1 (57:05):
Yeah me too, Me too. I I loved it a
couple of times that I've been able to do it.
Before I switched to my current job, I still could,
but now I'm a little bit more stingy. Uh frugal,
but frugal, that's that's the right word. Yeah, yeah, not

(57:29):
that I have to be, but I choose to be.
You know, it's a smart way to live. Uh, I
don't mind. I don't mind going around and paying for that.
And a lot of like conventions that do have workshops
that are laid led by professionals you do pay extra for.
But I I feel like you could find a better
balance if the entire convention was focused on that. You
could find a good way to do fan versus educational

(57:52):
versus interactive, workshop versus fun. Everybody bring your own ingredients
and we're just gonna have a blast with this kind
of a thing.

Speaker 3 (58:00):
You know, Yeah, totally.

Speaker 2 (58:02):
Well, I think that was a fun discussion about convention stuff.
And you know, while I haven't been to Dragon Con
in the last several years, I'll never say never, like
there might. I think if I were to go back,
it would probably be for a day because it's just
so overwhelming that I would probably do a day and

(58:22):
just kind.

Speaker 3 (58:23):
Of do the people watch.

Speaker 2 (58:26):
Seeing folks that I don't see that frequently would be
nice that kind of thing, Although it does then you
start asking yourself the question, do I really need to
pay that much money to see people I know? But
sometimes the answer is yes, because sometimes they're traveling from
across the country. So but I think it would be
more for a day thing, unless I'm there as a guest,

(58:48):
you know, to do panels and stuff, in which case
that would be different. But I don't pursue that typically
because I think there are other people who probably make
better guests, and I would rather they take that slot
then I take the slot.

Speaker 1 (59:04):
I think you make an amazing guest, Jonathan. But you
know that's very generous of you.

Speaker 2 (59:10):
Well, and again, like I want to make sure being
the host of a solo podcast for my main job.
I just I'm very hyper aware that there's a limited
utility for that in a live setting, Like if I
were part of a conversational podcast like this one, that
if that was my main thing, Like if I were
mostly known for that, then that would be different because

(59:32):
the two or three or however many of us could
go and be part of those panels, and that I
think would be far more entertaining than just a bald,
white dude talking about how he has a technology podcast.
I just don't think that that's like some people might
find that interesting. I just have a low expectation of that.

Speaker 1 (59:51):
Yeah, yeah, I mean I understand, I understand. Well, yeah,
I do think this is I agree with you. I
think this has been a fun conversation, you know, not
super structured, kind of went all over the place, largely
my fault, but yeah, a lot of fun.

Speaker 3 (01:00:07):
Yeah, So I guess we're wrapping up.

Speaker 1 (01:00:11):
Yeah, if you want to share if you were at
any conventions recently, you want to share about your experiences
or have ideas for conventions that you would throw or
anything else you want to chat with us about, Jonathan,
how can they get in touch with us?

Speaker 2 (01:00:26):
So you're gonna at the end of August next year,
you're gonna go to downtown Atlanta and you're gonna go
to the Sheraton Hotel downtown. Now you're gonna have to
try and find a door into the Sheraton.

Speaker 1 (01:00:41):
What'd you say, I said, good choice, that one's usually
a little less crowded.

Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
Yeah, But the see, that's the problem is that the
Sheraton's where all the badges are gonna be this year
in that's August, this particular August. So you're gonna try
the first stoor you're gonna go into, You're gonna look
for where the registration is uh, and you've gotta probably
wander around for about forty five minutes before you finally
track down someone who explains that it's actually.

Speaker 3 (01:01:06):
Two floors below.

Speaker 2 (01:01:07):
But because of the way the building's designed, you can't
actually get there from the floor you're on. So you're
gonna have to leave the building and walk around to
a different door, and that's where you're gonna find stairs
that lead down. You're gonna go down those stairs until
you go down two floors, But then you're gonna find
that the door that goes into the sheridan there, that
one's actually locked. You can't open it from that side.

(01:01:29):
You're gonna need to go back up those two stairs,
walk around again, find another door. This is gonna take
you to like what looks like a freight elevator. It's
clearly the elevator where you know housekeeping wheels their big
carts on. It's gonna be the only one you can
find that actually goes down to that floor that you
need to go to. The doors are gonna open up,
and you're gonna clearly be like in a maintenance hallway

(01:01:53):
type thing, a place where guests are not supposed to be.
You're gonna wander around that for probably about twenty five
minutes until you can actually feel humidity, which is telling
you that something in this part of the hotel is
not working properly. Gonna turn back around. That's where you're
gonna actually see a door that you already passed. You're
gonna open that up and you're gonna peek your head out.
You're gonna be looking right in the middle of a

(01:02:14):
long line right like you're opening the door and the
line is stretching from the right to the left immediately
in front of you, and people are gonna look at
you crazy like and say like, why are you coming
in this way? You don't have time for that. You
just gotta go and make your way to the end
of that line. You're gonna wait there, and you're going
to have to wait for another probably about hour fifteen minutes,

(01:02:36):
and finally gonna be at the front of the line.
You're gonna step forward at the desk. They're gonna inform
you that that's preregistration and what you actually wanted was registration,
which unfortunately is in a totally different hotel. So you're
going to have to leave the Sheridan. You've gotta walk
south two blocks to the Hyatt Regency. You're gonna walk
in there, and then as you walk in there, you're

(01:02:57):
gonna see me. I'm gonna be there holding your badge
saying sorry for the inconvenience.

Speaker 3 (01:03:03):
What's your question?

Speaker 1 (01:03:05):
And he won't really be sorry for the inconvenience. If
that just if that just is so many steps that
you've kind of glazed over. You can also reach us
on social media on Twitter where llenc Underscore podcast on Facebook,
Instagram threads which I've been really derelict about posting on

(01:03:27):
and discord. We're large Nerdron Collider. If you want to
shoot us an email, We're large Nerdron Pod at gmail
dot com. Yeah, and if you want to check out
show notes, I will eventually have them up on our website.
I'm really bad about getting those up in time, you know,
like last week we didn't have a show because Dragoncom,
but also I didn't post our LARP conversation notes until today. Anyhow,

(01:03:50):
you can reach us all those ways. We love hearing
from you. You know, if you've got suggestions for shows,
we still have some suggestions that we want to get to.
You know. We just we love goofing off with you,
and uh, you know, uh we appreciate you. So I'm
gonna stop, uh completely, just abloviating and sign off until

(01:04:14):
next time. I've been Ariel. I haven't had to pick
up my own badge in many, many years.

Speaker 2 (01:04:19):
Caston and I am Jonathan. I'm not kidding. That's how
registration works. Strickland The Large Nerdron Collider was created by
Ariel Caston and produced, edited, published deleted, undeleted, published again.
Curse That by Jonathan Strickland, music by Kevin McLeod of

(01:04:41):
incomptech dot Com